Striking Passport Staff Face Pay Threat

The Department of Foreign Affairs is threatening employees at the Passport Office with non-payment of their wages if they refuse to operate public counters today.

The announcement comes as industrial action in Dublin's Passport Office caused angry scenes and long queues yesterday and on Friday as members of the public were unable to collect their documents.

A queue of some 200 people has already accumulated outside the office in Molesworth Street, some waiting since 3.30am.

Minister for Foreign Affairs, Micheál Martin has asked staff in the Passport Service to resume normal working procedures and expressed "great concern" over the effects the ongoing Industrial Action is having "on the Irish public".

His department confirmed there is a backlog of 40,000 unprocessed passports, while the average waiting period has almost doubled to 20 days.

Mr Martin said: "As a result it has brought misery for many people who simply wanted the State to provide them with travel documents. There have been long queues outside Molesworth Street in Dublin.

"Conditions there are simply not acceptable. Some people have traveled long distances to collect a passport only to find the service to the public be withdrawn with little or no notice."

The union for the workers, Civil Public and Services Union (CPSU) said the notice was distributed yesterday telling staff that any period during which they refuse to carry out their duties could be considered a period of unauthorised absence.

For several weeks now the CPSU with the support of its sister unions, the PSEU and IMPACT has been staging low level action such as half day phone bans and half day public office closures each week across all Departments in the Civil Service.

However, CPSU Deputy General Secretary, Eoin Ronayne said the blame for the situation lay with senior management, and claimed the Department had ramped up public fear over the strike action, instigating a public rush to the passport office.

“It was sheer madness to scare the public into a panic when there was no need as the office will be open for business again as usual on Monday," Mr Ronayne said.

He confirmed that the low level action in place was now causing delays in passport production but said bringing hundreds of clients to the office to collect passports which were not ready was “dangerous and frankly, Machiavellian ”.

(DW/BMcC)